NAIROBI, Dec 6 (AFP) - United Nations needs some 102 million dollars to address needs in the Africa's Great Lakes region, a vast zone that was been ravaged by conflicts for several decades, UN Office of Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said here on Monday.
"Of the 102 million-dollar total, approximately 82 million dollars is requested for food assistance to address shortfalls for 1.88 million beneficiaries in Burundi, Rwanda and Tanzania," it said in a statement, adding a formal 2005 appeal will be launched on Tuesday.
The beneficiaries for the appeal for next year include, "refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), those returning to their places of origin, women, children and HIV/AIDS sufferers," the statement said.
"An estimated six million remain displaced; and millions more are affected by food insecurity, chronic poverty and a lack of basic resources," OCHA said, adding that conflicts in the last decade have claimed more than five million people in the region.
"These groups are vulnerable to human rights violations, malnutrition and diseases. Women have been systematically targeted and exploited, raped, abducted, forced into prostitution and coercively conscripted," it added.
"Despite the efforts of humanitarian workers with support of the international community, too many people remain unassisted given the staggering scale and cumulative nature of the many human humanitarian crises in the Great Lakes region," the statement said.
Since the region's states gained independence in the 1960s, and especially after the 1994 genocide in Rwanda that left some 800,000 people dead, the Great Lakes has suffered endless cycles of civil and regional wars, at a cost of millions of lives.
Now Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Burundi are in the advanced stages of peace processes that are due to lead to elections next year.
Tension is, however, high in the region after Rwanda threatened to sent troops in eastern DRC to flash out extremists, who fled there after committing the 1994 genocide that claimed some 800,000 people.
In Uganda, fresh efforts are under way for talks between the government and rebels whose conflict has ravaged the north since the mid 1980s.
041206
AF041250
©AFP 2004.. All Rights Reserved. AFP articles contained on the AEGiS web site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without AFP's prior written permission. You may make one copy of each article for your personal, non-commercial use only; more copies would require AFP's prior written permission. http://www.afp.com/
AEGiS is a 501(c)3, not-for-profit, tax-exempt, educational corporation. AEGiS is made possible through unrestricted grants from Boehringer Ingelheim, Elton John AIDS Foundation, the National Library of Medicine, Bridgestone Firestone Trust Fund, and donations from users like you. Always watch for outdated information. This article first appeared in 2004. This material is designed to support, not replace, the relationship that exists between you and your doctor.
©1990, 2004 - AEGiS. AEGiS presents published material, reprinted with permission and neither endorses nor opposes any material. All materials appearing on AEGiS are protected by copyright as a collective work or compilation under U.S. copyright and other laws and are the property of AEGiS, or the party credited as the provider of the content.
